Noriega: Parenting needs a rebrand, not $5,000
May 5, 2025, 5:00 PM
If blind faith isn’t enough to get you into the parenting game, how about a good old-fashioned rebrand? (Canva)
(Canva)
Editor’s note: This is an editorial piece. An editorial, like a news article, is based on fact but also shares opinions. The opinions expressed here are solely those of the author and are not associated with our newsroom.
The $5,000 proposal comes from the Trump administration. They call it a “baby bonus,” and it’s supposed to offset some of the costs of raising a child, especially in that first year.
Countries from around the world have tried to incentivize parents into having more children.
Taiwan began offering seven months of paid parental leave at 80% of the parents’ salary.
The United Kingdom offers 52 weeks of maternity leave at 90% pay.
In 2007, Russia gave away money, cars, and refrigerators to couples who gave birth to a child on June 12.
The baby decline continues.
It’s not that the incentives aren’t good enough, we’ve done a bad job of selling parenthood. Too often we focus on the cost, stress, or agony of parenting instead of love. How do you describe the love of a parent, not even Shakespeare had the words. It’s something that you have to experience, but that takes a lot of faith.
So if blind faith isn’t enough to get you into the parenting game, how about a good old-fashioned rebrand?
It worked for Taco Bell, Gatorade, and Mastercard. Who can forget:
Number 1: Taco Bell
Number 2: Gatorade
Number 3: Mastercard
The Mastercard rebrand is my favorite.
Two tickets: $18
Two hot dogs, two popcorn, two sodas: $18
One autograph baseball: $45
Real conversation: priceless
“There’s some things that money can’t buy. For everything else, there’s Mastercard.”
I want to buy something right now AND use my credit card to do it.
Almost 1 in 4 millennials and Gen Z-ers say they won’t have kids because it’s too expensive. It costs $300,000 to raise a child to 18.
- Food $3,254
- Daycare $11,752
- Transportation $6,010
- Rent $1,104
Etc, etc, etc.
Total annual cost: $21,681.
It’s easy to talk yourself out of that kind of investment and, increasingly, we are doing that very thing.
It’s something that concerns religious leaders as well as politicians.
The late Pope Francis spoke to the declining birth rate, “Without children and young people, a country loses its desire for the future.”
Francis said that “selfishness, consumerism and individualism” are the root causes of the declining birth rate.
The financial realities of raising a child are undeniable and substantial, but watching your child take their first unsteady steps? Priceless. Hearing a heartfelt, slightly lisped, “I wub you”? Utterly priceless. The beaming smile of triumph as they finally master riding a bike, wobbles and all? Indisputably priceless.
My personal rebrand would capture the first time my teenager actually takes my advice and acknowledges, “You were right.”
That is priceless.
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